Friday, May 6, 2016

Amalgamation Talk Said Pushing Buryats into Embrace of China and Mongolia

Paul
Goble

Staunton, May 6 – The Buryats, who
have already experienced the results of Vladimir Putin’s earlier regional
amalgamation drive, are reacting to new talk in Moscow about combining regions
and republics by talking about their need to develop even closer ties with
China and Mongolia, yet another way in which this Kremlin policy may backfire.

In a commentary on the AsiaRussia
portal today, Gleb Ryumin reviews the current discussion in the Transbaikal
about amalgamation and suggests that it raises two important questions: Who
benefits from all this? And what consequences will the implementation of such a
policy have? (asiarussia.ru/articles/12235/).

Almost a decade ago, Ryumin recalls,
Buryats watched the absorption of Agin Buryat AO by Transbaikal kray and the
Ust-Orda Buryat AO by Irkutsk oblast after Vladimir Zhirinovsky had called for
this, a call many Buryats first viewed as a bad joke and then as an indication
that their republic would soon be suppressed.

Over the last year, he continues,
the issue of unifying Buryatia and Irkutsk oblast has been raised again, first
and foremost by Irkutsk news agencies in an action some political analysts say
represents “a unique form of ‘trolling’ of the residents of Buryatia in the
interests f the Irkutsk authorities.”

Federation Chamber head Valentina
Matviyenko’s recent more general suggestion about amalgamation has divided
Buryats, with some experts suggesting that it can be safely ignored as no more
than her personal opinion and others as a worrisome indication that the earlier
amalgamation effort is about to restart.

But there is general agreement,
Ryumin says, that any amalgamation effort will begin “with small but closely connected
regions in the west of Russia or with those which are less well-off than
Buryatia.”If Moscow decides to do
something with the Buryat republic, experts say, it will do so only much later.

The experts base that conclusion on
the fact that any unification of Buryatia with “any of its neighboring federal
subjects” would not be useful because “it would give rise to too many problems”
and have only “doubtful” value.It would
open too many questions and provide few answers, they say.

Ryumin notes that “Buryatia has a
close ethno-cultural and socio-economic similarities with both Irkutsk oblast
and the Transbaikal kray. But the main pretender for ‘fusion’ in Buryatia
itself is traditionally considered to be Irkutsk oblast because it is
economically stronger.”No Buryat wants
to unite with the Transbaikal kray.

It is “strange,” the Buryat
commentator says, that some media outlets in the republic have listed Sakha as
a possible candidate for unification given that it doesn’t have any common
border with Buryatia and that they have ignored completely Tuva even though it
does.

In large measure over the last
decade the idea of amalgamating Buryatia with Irkutsk oblast has gained some
favor in the republic because of the lower energy prices in the predominantly
ethnic Russian region.Indeed, in Buryatia’s
troubled Tunkin district, the idea of combining with better-off Irkutsk is “very
popular.”

Buryatia head Vyacheslav Nagovitsyn
is dismissive of the idea that there will be any amalgamation of any kind, but
some observers see the latest discussion of the possibility as opening the way
for what could be an even more radical reordering of borders in the Transbaikal
and more generally.

Oleg Ayurzanayev with the Siberian
Post-Modern Political Observers Group suggests that regional amalgamation has
been raised in order to “test the reaction of the population” and “prepare it
for much more significant transformations,” including possibly the inclusion of
Mongolia within Russian borders or the formation of a broader Mongol-Chinese
state.

Such things may sound “fantastic”
today,” he acknowledges, but argues that “several years ago the idea that
Russia could fight with Ukraine would have been considered insane. But now it
is a reality” given that “we live in an era of the post-modern in which
customary ideas and borders no longer are as clear … not only in art but among
states.”

Given the possibility of Mongolia
becoming part of Russia or Mongolia and Buryatia becoming part of an expanded
China, Ayurzanayev says,“all fears about the unification of the autonomy are in
themselves senseless,” nothing more than a testing of the waters for “a new
economic formation controlled by China” in the region by 2020.

Taking all this into consideration,
Ryumin argues in conclusion, “Buryatia must strengthen its business and
cultural connections with these states given that the republic is a unique ‘buffer’
between Russia as a special Orthodox Slavic civilization and the Central Asian
world.”

“As far as the role of Buryatia
within Russia itself is concerned,” he adds, “it should pursue a course to
raise its significance in view of the special characteristics of its situation
so that Buryatia will be not a faraway province dependent on the center but one
of the key subjects of the federation, not a border-region administrative unit”
but “a bridge from Russia to Asia.”